Awful Alleys
by Lily McIntire
Summary: A collection of darker paths our favourite couple could take. In other words, awful alleys. Read/Review!
1. Alley One

_So, hello! I want to first mention that all of my incomplete stories are totally going to be updated soon. NEVER FEAR._

_Next, this SPOILERquote from wherever made my insides turn, ickily (because I don't really want to be more surprised than I've ever been by Caskett), which is where I got the idea for this little collection of awful endings that could result from where C&B are in the show right now, after "47 Seconds". I'm very excited for it to get worse, because with heartache comes great inspiration - my favourite episode to date, is 2x24. _

_Some of these endings are not exactly awful, just suggest awful possibilities. In fact, the first one has a somewhat optimistic conclusion. I know darker Caskett isn't exactly what the shipper world is after, right now, but I think the idea of Andrew Marlowe-esque surprises holds many interesting avenues. I hope you'll stick around to go down some, with me! _

**Disclaimer: Characters = ABC. Stories = mine.**

_/Potential/Spoiler/Alert/ "Question: Any news if Castle and Beckett will become Caskett in the season finale? —Cat_

_Ausiello: Funny you should ask. We ran into Castle co-star Jon Huertas (Esposito) over the weekend at the 26th annual Genesis Awards and here's what he had to say about the season-ender: "I think the audience is going to be surprised about what happens between Castle and Beckett. More surprised than they ever have been." Interesting. One might even say veddy interesting."_

* * *

><p>"Is something wrong, Castle?" It wasn't really a question – she knew something was up. He'd been…distant, especially this morning, zoning in and out. His face was obviously shades darker than usual; even his hair appeared droopy and faded compared to its typical luster.<p>

But because she cared, because she was bothered by his appearance, she asked.

"Castle," His eyes slowly rolled towards hers, meeting them, locking on. Clinging, even. "You okay?"

His eyes sunk into his skull. "Hm? Yeah, fine." Very convincing.

"The boys were talking about stopping by the Apple store during lunch. Ryan's iPhone is glitchy." She prompted, tone even and tempting his love of gagdets. Nothing.

"…interested?" Her brows knit together, worried. He'd never been so…silent.

"I'll stay. Keep busy with paperwork." It was like he wasn't there, mentally. She resisted the urge to wave her hand in front of his face, she was probably just overreacting.

Paperwork? "Are you kidding?" Not once, in all four years that he had shadowed her-

"Alexis has had me up. Researching careers. Internships. Things." His voice was empty, and exhausted. She could see straight through his lie, no one would buy it. But she was. Because whatever had him so defeated? That Richard Castle was being beaten by something – it scared the crap out of her.

"I was thinking…" He grunted his attention, preoccupied with himself. That was all.

"…of showing you my talents involving ice cubes." She tried burning a hole through him with her eyes, as his were set on some sight far in front of him and his chair beside her desk, outside the walls of the twelfth.

"Gates is considering arming you." She nudged his forearm, still on the arm of his chair.

"You got a pen?" Her eyeballs fell out of her head. He seemed to suddenly snap back to reality, oblivious of all she'd said. She gaped, drifting her arm across her desk to grab a pen, and hand it to him. Her fingers brushed his, they were warm.

So why was he acting so cold?

* * *

><p>She'd been called in to an interview, and then lunch had come. Castle was nowhere to be found, so she went and grabbed a water and a sandwich, picking up an extra, as well as coffee for him. Safe from the whipping winds outside of the precinct, she stepped out of the elevator with swept hair, skin flush with the last remaining kisses of winter. Her green eyes were clear and focused, honing in on her partner, moving steadily towards him, heels clicking on the floor…which usually caught his attention. She was about to lose her grip and demand he talk, when his head lifted from the pile of paperwork in front of him, eyes dim with their familiar twinkle, mouth turned upwards.<p>

"Hey. That for anyone special?" He flicked his pen towards the extra coffee and to-go bag in her hands.

"Only you." He appeared to have worked through lunch. That also meant that he hadn't risen from the chair since he had half fallen into it when he entered her world this morning, later than usual. Hm…

She set the food and drink on her desk, Castle easily abandoning the paperwork. Whatever had gotten to him, the distraction of dull paperwork had its benefits on his mood. She shucked off her coat, draped it over the back of her chair, and resumed occupancy of it. Slow week. Slow case. But it gave her time to focus a little more on Castle than she usually would have. It earned him a lot more smiles, a lot more lingering looks, a lot more of her. They'd been out, doing something after work every night of the week. Now that she thought back on it, he had been off, a little bit, for a while. Nothing too off-putting, though. Not until today. That morning. He seemed to be recovering, now. But he had already flagged her radar.

* * *

><p>Ten minutes later, she was standing opposite Lanie in the morgue, as she sewed up a John Doe. Homeless, hit by a bus – only after he'd been stabbed in the gut. Probably for his wallet. Petty theft.<p>

"Might just be a cold. Book deadlines? Alexis should be hearing from colleges soon, you know. The man has a life outside of following-" Her girlfriend cut off, unthinking as she focused on the final stitches near the collar bones of Mr. Doe, but Beckett caught it.

"Outside of following me." She puffed out a breath, fingers drawing along the edge of the metal autopsy slab. "Don't be sorry." She rushed it out, before her friend could apologize. "I don't like it, how everyone side-steps around me. How no one says 'sniper', how no one talks about my mother's case, how Montgomery kept everything from me-"

"To keep you safe." Lanie interjected. "To keep you safe. Because we care-"

"Because you care? If Montgomery had cared a little less, I might have gotten to the warehouse with those files before it 'accidentally' burnt down." Her tone was awful, mood singed by the memory of the final lost lead on her mom's case. She didn't want care, if this was it.

"I'm not- I'm not going to break. I can handle the truth! I'm functional, rational, been on active for almost a year since…I was shot. By. A. Sniper." Her arms were crossed, point proven as she paced alongside the body while Lanie cut the final stitch.

"Don't be mad at us. You're mad at Castle for all the things he hasn't said that you won't even say yourself. You're mad that he might finally be moving on. You're mad at him for doing the very same thing you've been doing, for almost two years! Keepin' secrets." Beckett stopped pacing, eyes raised to Lanie's, exuding ice. "Honey, honey! When do you think was the last time he got some, huh? He's been everything to you, but a man can only wait in idle for so long-"

"So you don't think he's been down because of something at home?" Her eyes were hopeful, wishing that was the answer, after all.

"Look, I don't know the man's life. _You're_ his muse, woman! But I do get some time with Alexis over these bodies, and that girl is exhausted when she leaves here, I make sure of that, and no way in frosty hell could she be awake all night, causing inconsiderate noise at that. You're the detective here," Lanie raised one arm, swished it around in Beckett's direction as she prepared blood sample slides for the microscope, "detect."

It was now Beckett's turn to resort to grunting noises, as her heels clicked their way out of autopsy. Castle was _her_ business, Lanie had a point. She'd get it out of him.

* * *

><p>"Why detective, so nice to have you rejoin the living." She laughed, had he seriously not looked in a mirror that day? "Body drop?" His voice was eager, but with pointed curiosity, versus enthusiasm. Honestly…where was her Castle?<p>

"Nope. Not a one." She watched him carefully.

"Damn. Murder has taken its holiday. I could be out of a job, if this keeps up." She rolled her eyes as she walked around him and sat, opening up her email for sorting, deleting, and mostly, avoiding requests. She had a special folder for them, for the interviewers and brown-nosing reporters and chain mail sent around the precinct determining the amount of paperwork you would have if you didn't forward, and that folder was titled "Junk". It was very, very full, even though the folder was set to delete its contents every thirty days – she filtered through her inbox every other day if a case didn't have her by the wrists. The bold black letters next to the icon of a manila folder read **189**, indicating how much unopened mail was waiting patiently for those thirty days to be up. For the most part, she was a homebody, and besides that, a very private one. She didn't need the press advertising her complicated partnership with Castle, and she didn't want to cause his name, or his publisher (as well as Sir), the trouble of gossip. Of her. It was the reason for so many things, hoping to keep her trouble to herself, and away from Castle…no matter how close she wanted to be to him.

She sighed, resting her chin in her open palm as she marked her junk mail one by one, dragging it over to the folder repeatedly. Her foot tapped absently beneath her desk, against one anchor of her chair, body relaxed, accepting, just a little bit, this slow, slow day. It filled her with a comfortable calmness, having Castle so near, so productive, right beside her. She listened to his breath, watched from the corner of her eye as he made little doodles he tried to cover from her with one hand, and simply could not be anything but content, in this moment that would bore anyone else to a whatever degree. She could touch him, if she wanted. He was that close. _He was that close._

As she patrolled her inbox further, she thought back on her conversation with Lanie. He didn't look like he was moving on. He looked off, but not like he was moving on. She sipped her coffee, swallowed slowly. The liquid spread its warmth down her throat, her chest, pooling in her stomach. Was it time? Time to tell him, time to let the cat out of the bag. Time to jump. For him. He was worth it. He was doing paperwork for her, for goodness sake! He was impressive. He was incredible, for her.

Looking, or more exactly staring at him work, her heart lightened. He scribbled quickly over the papers under his bent posture, eyes scanning the typed words of the pages faster than even she could. His marks were experienced, quick little checkmarks or comments, scrawled in his own – his Castle scrawl. She liked his crooked, but even letters, his uppercase print. "_Why is that, Kate? Why are you so fond of his handwriting?"_ She could ask herself, had asked herself, in hundreds of different ways. It wasn't his handwriting she was fond of, and she found herself smiling at him as she considered this. It was him, because it was _his_. And because…he was hers. Unless she let him get away.

He noticed. He stiffened just a little bit – shoot. "Beckett?"

"Castle."

"You're staring, you know."

"Observing, as you say. I'm bored."

"I could keep you busy." She dropped the pencil she'd been twiddling with, a hitch in her heart. He paused, looking up. God, he looked worse than before. She tried not to wince for him. "Paperwork, naughty detective. It has no end. It's going to take me alive!" He made drowning noises, reached for her in his dramatics, and her fingers twitched towards him. He was too busy embracing his inner Martha Rodgers to notice, however, and for this, she was thankful, playing it off as adjusting herself in her chair. If only he knew how often little things like that had been happening, lately. If he only knew.

* * *

><p>After some smiles and some eye contact and some lighthearted humour they each return to working. He is relaxed against her desk, humming every now and then in low, long tones. They tickle her belly. Her left hand is practically touching his right one, pinkies nearly intersecting. She's working, too, signing off on statements and doing more clicking in her email, just so her hand can remain where it is. She imagines his warm one on top of hers, like they've done before, but knows he'd never, knows she'd never let him, here. So, pinkies almost touching is enough. Enough for now.<p>

He makes a drowning noise, again, and without looking away from her desktop she pinches his hand so he'll knock it off. He doesn't know how to enjoy being, being close. He makes the noise again, this time his right hand whisks away from her left abruptly, and she flips her gaze to him, ready to scold her misbehaving partner for disturbing the precinct _yet again_, when she sees his face.

It's so white. His lips are dry. He's coughing, coughing a storm, like he's got a loose lung. He's choking- but on what? She moves her chair back, helpless-she can't shoot whatever is choking him-reaching for him as he covers his mouth. When he takes his fingers away, his palms are bright, cherry red. Blood settles on his bottom lip, such a color compared to his face, empty of it. He looks at her, and she falters, falters rising from her chair. That was it, no more games. "Ryan, tell Gates we went to the ER." Ryan and Esposito look up from their own phone calls and paperwork, alarm slipping onto their faces when they see Castle, reaching for a tissue to clean himself up. They rise. "No, you guys stay here. I'll bet you a box of doughnuts bodies start dropping like flies." Cop humour. Ryan's phone rings. He's in awe. "The holiday is over. Take care of business here; I'll take care of Castle." The look on his face when she turned back to him made her revisit her words, but she didn't care. The time for careful tiptoes was over, until they made it to the ER and he was cleared. It was just a tough cold. Some antibiotics oughtta do the trick.

This time, it was Esposito's phone that rang, and he was soon scribbling a street address down, holstering his weapon from the drawer of his desk.

"Looks like your job is saved, writer-boy." She plays a weak smile for him, snatching her keys and coat, and his wrist. He comes, the way a small child would drag along in his mother's wake. He's afraid, and she can feel it, feel the heat of him on her back. The elevator is waiting, right on their floor, and once its doors close on them and their preferred silence, she drops her hold on his wrist down to his hand, and squeezes, pressing their palms together. It would have been okay for their communication to end right there, except, he squeezed her hand back, only barely. Distanced.

**_TBC..._**


	2. Ending One

He was dripping everywhere, despite the tissues. Despite the water she'd tried to shove down his throat that he couldn't keep down, despite her sirens, cars were not moving fast enough. Her heart was pounding madly against her chest, eyes fixated on maneuvering through rush hour traffic. Her fingers had the steering wheel in a death grip, all of her senses on edge. She was ready for anything. She wanted to hit something; couldn't people hear the damn siren? Damnit damnit damnit!

Neither of them had said anything. Only the sounds of his frequent coughing and her blood pressure pounding in her ears were residual throughout her replacement Crown Vic and- what? Blood. More. His blood. Outside of his body. He was wheezy, too. _Jesus, Castle, what happened to you?_

"I'd say timing's impeccable, as always." She was pushing fifty, dodging traffic, littered garbage, old ladies…she couldn't bring herself to respond.

"Maybe you forgot, but points in this game are bad." Under her tire went the lid of someone's trash can. She dared the accelerator further down. He needed to stop. Shut up. He needed to shut up, or she was going to lose her cool. How could he be so oblivious? How could he act like he hadn't – like this wasn't serious? He could barely make it down the steps of the precinct without her gripping his bicep for support (with no time to enjoy it, either), and was slouched so far into the seat that he couldn't possibly be holding himself up.

"Do you feel hot?" Her teeth and jaw were clenched shut, the words a cluster of the tension between her and street pedestrians. She'd lost ten miles per hour again, because of an ignorant adolescent with ear buds deafening his ears, and that was only a reflex – she would have squashed him like a bug.

"And bothered," Castle smeared the words her way, tugging the strings of her heart. She wanted to punch him in the face, make his nose bleed too (although that might suffocate him), anything to make him take this seriously. She was doing double the worrying, the stressing, and serious-taking, for them both, and barely in control of her short, ready-to-cry-breaths jumping in her chest.

He reached forward, pushing the button on the dash that made the sirens bleep. He pushed it twice.

"Castle!" She would strangle him if he didn't drown in his own fluids, first. Her anger rose to the top of her head, causing her brain to shake violently beneath her skull. Her foot was slammed against the gas pedal, unable to shoot him glares of death and punishment to come because she knew that looking at him would break all of her fury, her rage, it would break her right in two. They would probably crash, and go down in a fiery mesh of blistered skin and molted metal, like they'd originally thought Joe and Vera had.

She had to look. She punched him with a glance, bewildered by him, and immediately regretful. He was…bloody and fragile-looking and not Castle, but he was also…looking at her. This look was different than the kind of looking that suggests dirty intentions, different from admiration, affection for a muse, different from partner love eyeballs. It was so pure, so boyish, so full of overwhelming emotions that she felt a tear escape her eye and slide mercilessly down her cheek. He wouldn't be able to see from his seat, but she suddenly did. She saw that she was an ungrateful coward.

They all knew; she was the only one fooling herself. She could break, and she would break – she was coming apart now, as the hospital came into a distanced view. Precautions were taken to keep her safe. _Always_. And she'd just been so angry with him…unnecessarily cruel. She had an idea, a feeble thanks, and reached for the dashboard. She pressed and held her finger over the button, heart fluttering with his as she heard the siren make a long bleep. Even when he was sick, he was taking care of her.

Remnants of Lanie's words continued to echo in her chaosed head –

"_To keep you safe. Because we care."_

Then, she pushed it again.

* * *

><p>Sitting as absolutely still as she could, she opened her hands. Again. If she moved, if she began moving, she knew she'd never stop. This was the only way to wait, the only way not to worry. She curled her fingers back together.<p>

It had been a significant amount of time since a nurse wheeled him away. They'd already waited for hours before a doctor rushed by, skidded to a stop, and recognized him. Richard Castle. Ill? Waiting for hours? Apologies came from the man in scrubs, but honestly, all she heard was a nurse come after the yadda yadda of the doctor, and her partner's strong assertion that no, he did not need help standing and sitting down in the wheelchair by himself. He barely made it, his face grayer for the effort…an effort for her. The last thing she wanted right now was to take his strength from him, when much better costs could be paid with it. She remembered embracing his blue eyes before Nurse Jackie-or whoever-took him away from her, giving him everything in her, strength included. _"Use it to come back to me."_

Less than forty-seven seconds later, he was beyond her sight, and her protection. She stilled right then, unmoving and cold as stone, and began the one thing she never envied of waiting room families when she would come to meet Josh at his hospital – the waiting game.

* * *

><p>This game, was bullshit. Her gun was shoving uncomfortably against her hip. Loose hairs from her bun were taunting her cheeks and eyes, poking, provoking, trying to break her. She wasn't moving. Nothing except her hands, her flesh, mixed with his blood. It was romantically gross, and she should probably disinfect ASAP…not happening.<p>

There was a time, not too long ago, that Castle had played this exact same game, with her blood on his hands – the roles now reversed. Difference was, Castle had been in the company of his family. The boys, Lanie. Her father. …Josh, if only momentarily. But her? She was alone. She did all the hard things better, this way. She didn't have to worry about reassuring others that she was fine, didn't have to think outside of her head. She could hide, there, occupy herself.

Her gun and her flyaway hair told her this was taking too long. They told her to move. They told her to worry.

* * *

><p>How was she to reach Martha and Alexis, if no one answered the phone in the loft? The thought of doing this hadn't occurred to her until just recently, and picking up the loft's answering machine, a useless one to be had. She didn't leave a message, but would try again, in ten minutes. This allowed her to have something important to do, a reason to break the stillness, the silence she had created around her. Elbows against her knees, crouched away from the wretched, awful waiting room chair, she was useless.<p>

"Detective Beckett?" An unfamiliar doctor was approaching her. Shoving her phone into the pocket of her jeans, she stood, nodded once. She opened her mouth to ask – 'How is he?' – 'Is something wrong?' – 'Can I see him?', but each seemed like wasted words. Doctors knew the questions; they didn't need to be asked.

"How is he, is something wrong? Can I see him?" Mm, way to play that one, Becks.

"Mr. Castle is ill, you were right to bring him here. We've done some tests, administered a prescription, and set him up in a room for observation. If he feels up to it, he can probably go home tonight. Room 117 – down this hall, first left, and follow the numbers." The man smiled at her, and she tried not to collapse in a fit of unshed tears and happiness. Trembling a bit, she shook his hand, and sprinted the way he'd directed her.

* * *

><p>"Hey." She managed to keep it low-key this time, a smooth greeting, and a grand grin, just for him.<p>

"Hey yourself." He returned her smile, twinkle glaring behind his eyes. In the best way. "You can come over here, you know. They sprayed me down pretty good." She shook her head, removing herself from the doorway, long strides meeting his bedside easily. She sat on his blanket, finding the roundness of his cheeks and the pink of his lips as refreshing as a spring shower. His colour wasn't healthy, but neither was he, though it had brightened some.

He swallowed, pulled her arm towards him, and let his head fall back onto his mammoth stack of pillows. Someone had definitely been working the nurses. She would have it none other way than this one. "What's the diagnosis?"

No response. His hand took hers, rubbing smooth circles over the back of it with his thumb. Any remaining tension within her dissolved as if it had never been, her heart alive with the connection of his pulse. Weird, though – his skin felt clammy, and hot, like wax. He wasn't looking at her, the room dark, filled with shadows. She pressed closer to him, searching for his eyes. She was confused, and didn't understand the sudden change in him, in the room, in everything. He turned his head to her slowly, looking up to meet her eyes, the grip on her hand entirely too tight for comfort. His was much thinner than she'd thought, from far away, and his eyes were gray. His cracked lips parted, taking in a long, difficult wheeze. The heart monitor beside her began slowing, way too slow, as she watched it for a moment. Moving to get a nurse, she found herself captive to Castle's iron grip. Her own heart rate sped up, looking around for a way out. He looked horribly fragile and lingering towards dead, with needles in his arms and a breathing tube in his neck. A tube…when?

She couldn't move. Her heart stopped. "Castle," she whispered weakly. Gone? Was he…gone? Just like that?

On the verge of total system shutdown, his eyes snapped fully open, giving her a look that chilled her to her bones. She noticed his hair had thinned considerably in these past thirty seconds, broken blood vessels lining his face. What had they given him? He screamed, and the answer was all too clear.

"YOU!" The word knocked into her, and she stumbled backward. "I love you, Kate."

* * *

><p>"<em>I love you. I love you, Kate."<em>

Sunlight peaked through her eyelids, mind fuzzy, and body cozy beneath her covers. She gradually blinked her eyes open, to find a wave of hair covering her face, and obscuring her vision. She picked herself up from her stomach and off of her right arm, bent beneath her body. Not knowing how long it had been trapped under there, it was numb. She tried shaking the blood back through, swiping her bedhead hair out of her face as she moved to sit on the edge of her roomy queen, flinching when she rolled onto her hip where she'd been pressed against an unforgiving brick wall the other day, fighting with a suspect. The memory of her sig crushed crudely against her bone, and the bruising it had caused was wiped away with the rest of the sleepiness from her eyes.

Taking in a slow, even breath, a vision of dream Frankencastle haunted her behind her eyelids. He was fine. He had to be fine, he couldn't not be fine.

She grabbed for her phone, flicking through messages until she found his usual Saturday offer in relief – late breakfast a la mode at this traditional pancake house they'd discovered. It was delicious, and it was theirs.

Nestled next to her good morning message is the picture he assigned to his contact in her phone – the one that's pretty old now, where he's borrowed her desk name plate, holding it up in front of his face – which she stares at, wondering aloud…

"How many more mornings am I going to wake up to the sound of your voice?" She responds to his love as she has every morning since his confession began its haunt of her, though only mentally, not yet able to give voice to the words:

"_I love you. I love you, Rick."_

She's hopeful, now. Soon.

* * *

><p><strong>END<strong>

_P.S. Let me know what you thought of this one! I might have to do alternate endings, or something, it was tough to pick only one. More awful alleys, to come._


	3. Alley Two

_Inspired by "Princess of China"._

_Their splintered partnership. A few weeks after the fact._

_Disclaimer: These beautiful people could never be of my own creation. But this story could be. _

* * *

><p>All it took was brewing the coffee.<p>

All it took was realizing she didn't have to call him.

In his pajamas, at nine AM, he curled his back over the island in his kitchen, elbows planted, rubbing his face with his hands. He had to forget.

She hesitated by her desk, his contact pulled up, ready for dialing. The boys were waiting. She had to move on.

"You guys go ahead. I'll sit this one out." She nodded to her team without further explanation, and they didn't ask for one. They left. So did she.

"Dad?" Alexis. Didn't she have school? An internship?

"Running late? I could make you a to-go cup." He lifted his head, tried to act the pain away.

She shook her long, long hair. "Dad. Gram told me not to, and I know it's not really my business, but –"

"I'm fine; readjusting is all." He reached for the coffee pot, but her light touch against his forearm halted the action. He gave her a questioning look.

"I want to know what happened with Detective Beckett."

* * *

><p>Her fingers lingered on the knob of the heavy wooden door; beyond it, she faced the cold, brutal truth. She needed it. She quickly clenched the knob, turned it, and entered the dark room, illuminated only by the rays of daylight that filtered through the walls' single window. In his usual posture he was evenly still, a permanent fixture of the space. He sat patiently, waiting for her to come at her own pace. Approaching the big chair opposite the man, she realized she couldn't sit. She was positive that if she sat, her resolve would crumble.<p>

"Kate, welcome."

Her eyes flew from the empty leather chair to his eyes, those eyes that never told her a damn thing.

"Oh."

"I told her how I felt about her," It was so wrong to be talking to his teenage daughter about this. He must really be some kind of fool. "She knew, this whole time. She lied. She…ran. She always ran."

Alexis was quiet. Listening. "We fell apart." He said it bluntly, without emotion. They had fallen apart, magnificently. He quieted. Could it really be that simple? It didn't feel so simple. But, that seemed to sum it up.

When his daughter realized he was done sharing, her precious blue eyes searching his face for answers and finding none, she removed her hand from his arm. "Oh."

"We were in sync." She wasn't trying to make any of it make sense for him, hell, it didn't make much sense to her. It was just a bunch of emotions, a bunch of secrets, a bunch of miscommunications. It was just broken.

"We were partners. It was – different – fighting. He stopped…waiting for me. All we ever seemed to do was fight. Our fists were always raised." She knitted her fingers together, apart, thumbs drumming upon one another.

"We were on the same side, the side of the victims."

"We worked so well together because we both understood the purpose, who we were working for." She drew in a breath.

"Once upon a time, anyway." His head hung, he examined his countertop. Time for a refurnish?

"I was going to tell him. How I- how I felt."

"I was going to tell her. But once I realized…no use, right?" He cocked his head to the side, smoothing his fingertips over the unblemished countertop.

* * *

><p>"Why did you back down, Kate?" She shot the older man a glare that softened with her shrug.<p>

"He pulled away. He didn't want me, anymore." She focused on the creamy beams of light playing hide-and-seek with the neutral carpet. "I used to think," she swallowed once, throat closing up. "It's silly now, but I used to think…_I_ could be a Castle. I would have worn his ring. But." She drew her knuckles across her forehead, chest constricted, forbidding herself to cry. "He…"

"…let me go." He cleared his throat. "We obviously met our peak, though, as partners. Pushed too hard for too much and it caved." Alexis leveled his gaze.

"So you gave up, just like that? After everything?" She looked like she might cry, ah jeez.

"She-"

"He really hurt me." She turned her head away from Dr. Burke, smoothing her hands over her thighs, and the arm of the chair where she was perched. She could hear the sniffles in her voice, feel the redness of her nose and cheeks.

"That's it?" His eyes had softened a little, trying to draw her back. Castle hadn't done that, not once he met his flight attendant.

"Arguing got to the point where a single case would drag on, falling mostly on the shoulders of Esposito and Ryan. We couldn't work together. We couldn't sync." He paused.

"Gates cut him loose. She said we both would have been out the door, if not for my record. Before him." She gave her shoulder an itch, taking a moment to cradle her thin frame.

"At that point, I was glad to go. As much as I care about the stories and the closure…" He smiled at his little girl, tired. "Well, I'm no cop."

"He didn't _understand_ the responsibilities of carrying a weapon. He shouldn't have had one."

"Do you think anyone else would have even considered protecting him in the way that you did?"

"He signed the paperwork - civilian ride-along. Not amateur detective. He knew the risks; he just acted out to look cool for his new cop buddies. And he got hurt because of it." She scoffed, spoiled anger bubbling.

Castle patted his bandaged arm. "She was out of line. But I was the outsider. In the end." He grimaced a bit as he traced the damaged tissue beneath the wound's wrappings.

"He just wouldn't quit. He was so insubordinate, out of control, out in the line of fire, the very difference between a civilian and a cop. He was beyond listening. It didn't matter how I felt, he wasn't in a position to hear it, or have it matter."

"A hurt sandwich is not easy on the digestive system."

"I've always put the job first, been Detective, first. Kate came second. He was changing me. I was Kate more than I was Beckett. But when I saw that gun…I knew our personal relationship had blurred the line with professionalism. I cannot be responsible for him and that gun. Even if he signed his name a million times, if he hurt someone – I can't even –"

"Dysfunctional doesn't do it justice. If we couldn't operate together on cases, we couldn't ever…" He shuddered, bitter wounds and subdued longing clashing inside his abdomen.

Alexis sat in bold silence, until:

"If you love her, why don't you do something?" Perhaps she hadn't been listening as intently as he had thought.

"Because she really hurt me."

"Because he really hurt me."

"Oh." Alexis looked ashen. He shouldn't be sharing this. He stood up straight, resigning from the conversation. Without hesitation he grabbed an apple and washed it off, taking a bite as he cleaned up around the already clean counter. "You gonna be out all day? I have chapter deadlines to meet, so-"

"What happens to Nikki and Rook?" She faced him, seriousness stretching over her ears and down her neck, thick.

He didn't have an answer. Magic eight ball says try again later.

"Dad?" His eyes were called back to her by the solidity of her voice, newspaper now folded under his arm. He took another fleshy bite of his fruit, slurping up the juice that spilled from the side of his mouth.

"She has your heart." And with that, Alexis turned, picked up her purse, and promptly left the loft.

Kate sighed, chest empty.

"Oh."

* * *

><p>end.<p> 


	4. Alley 3: Song of the Storm

**Song of the Storm**

It was raining. The storm slipped into the loft from the open windows, making each room appropriately chilly. All the Castles loved a good storm.

He was writing. He was hurting. Well, Rook was hurting. He, Richard, was projecting.

It wasn't right. No matter how he edited the scene, it refused to read the way he meant it. Rook had been shot down (metaphorically) by Nikki – "I love you, Nik. One and done, you say? Marry me. _Me_."

No matter where he went from that point, Nikki Heat came across as a coldhearted, satanistic woman with her "no"s and clumsy apologies, when she was not. She was not. Detective Beckett might be, but not Nikki Heat.

He sighed massively, and when an idea finally purred and sparked within his head - a knock, at the study door. He wasn't happy being interrupted during such critical thinking, which he did nothing to hide as his eyes flicked upwards at the door.

Well. He'd been expecting...not her.

"Kate." The emotional content of his face scattered beneath his hairline, tossed and greasy from distressed fingers combing through it all morning. He hadn't heard the door buzz.

"Alexis let me in." She was hiding her body in his door frame, as if he was the one assaulting her heart instead of the other way around.

"Need something?" He sat back in his chair, fingers retreating from the keyboard of his laptop.

"I don't want to intrude…" she drew lines along the door frame with her fingers, all innocent and drawn out. Like she was the victim.

"Already are, I'd say." He didn't owe her much, if anything.

She came forward, right to him, leaning over his desk with sudden courage. "Can we talk? I tried…tried calling you."

He held up his phone, wiggled it in his hand, and dropped it back to his desk. He knew. And he'd ignored her. No discussion was to be had, he didn't want one. He'd announced his departure, and he'd departed. She didn't get a say.

"Ah. I wasn't sure…"

"Or didn't want to believe a man could ignore a phone call from the irresistible Katherine Beckett?" He felt nothing. She made him numb. Numb, and cold, and cruel. A bully, when all he was doing was protecting his bleeding heart. Her eyes crept away from his, uncomfortable in his loft. She retreated a few steps from his desk, otherwise ignoring his jab.

"Not a man. You, Rick…you." She moved again, sitting (more like sinking) on the arm of his leather chair, looking at things, things not him. She seemed willing to push past his bad attitude to try and talk to him, bring out the Castle who brought her coffee every day, who answered her calls no matter how early, though they never came late. "Could you…tell me why? Even if it won't change anything." She was pulling on the long sleeves of her grey turtleneck, shielding her wrists and fingers. _Defense mechanism. _

"You really want to hear it again?" A bit of misplaced concern crept through his mask of stone, and he immediately regretted it, the way her head snapped up to greet him with stupidly hopeful eyes. "The reason hasn't changed." He wouldn't let her hopes escalate. She needed to accept the end of their partnership, as he was forced to accept that she didn't love him back. What a little bitch, karma.

The silence that sat with them in the room satisfied her answer to him. Her eyes were grayer than green today, steady on him like steel. "My inspirations have taken me elsewhere. I've been following you for four years; it's about time I put away the laser guns, and stopped pretending. I'm not a cop." He let the words surround her, before calling them to attack. "Unlike you, I have a family. People to live for. People who need me." He kept his very blue eyes empty, on her.

The confident posture she wore caved into a defeated hunch, thin skeleton falling into itself. He wasn't immune to all emotion – watching this was painful, for him. But she was a coward, and couldn't bring herself to end something that had been in a stalemate since that day on the swings. He wasn't a coward – he had expressed his heart, he had done everything in preparation of her, and now he was doing one last thing for her – ending their partnership. Before he was shot and killed, needlessly.

"But I…" _need you_. It was amazing, that even now, his heart held out one last hope, that his mind would finish her sentence for her, say what she really meant, like it used to. But it had obviously been wrong all of those times, and this one, because she didn't love him. Not enough.

When she realized he wasn't going to help her, finish her sentence, speak for her, she closed her mouth, hand absentmindedly pressed against the marble sill of the open window behind her. "It's so sudden, Castle. I thought we were…could have been…more than. This." He knew exactly what she was saying, what she meant with her broken words. Yet he remained silent and unmoving, looking at her as if she'd murdered his mother in cold blood, as if she'd done something so terribly unforgiving…when all she'd been trying to do this year was heal, heal for him. So she'd be ready, for him. Now he was walking away from her.

"I don't understand why. Why you're doing this. You can't give us- it, time? Out of the blue you just – just drop me, and, and the boys, like another wife to divorce." She tensed, felt the anger flare in him from across the room, didn't dare look up this time. Shit. That had just slipped out, she was upset in so many ways, put off guard, confused and hurt and –

"If that's the way you see it, then why the hell are you 'ere?" He was standing, voice booming, his chair rolling to the cabinets behind his writing desk, face shadowed in anger and betrayal. That comparison was more than she understood, the tender vein in him that no one got through to, unless they had his heart. And he'd stupidly handed his to her, as if she deserved it. As if she was worth something.

But he didn't get to be the only one who was upset. He'd been pulling, yanking away from her, and just when she thought things were cooling back down to some form of normalcy, when she thought she saw an opening to tell him _everything_, he told her goodbye for good, that it had been their last case together _after_ the case had ended - like a coward - and _she_ deserved the wrath of Hates?

Blood boiling, eyes narrow and body trembling with heat, she stood too, and threw one long, quivering, furious finger directly at Richard Castle's chest - specifically, his heart.

"FOR. YOU! I have done nothing but work out all of the utter _bull_shit that got me shot last year, been handed my ass on a polished platter by Gates more times than you know just to keep you around! The little snide remarks I get from other cops, the crap about "dishonoring the badge" by putting your precious life in danger, by showing instability and lapse of judgment – my reputation is _sunk_ after your bromance escapade with Slaughter! I'm on probation, practically cuffed to Gates, and what for? So you can tell me your "inspiration has taken you elsewhere"? The whole dramatic act is bull, Castle, and you know it!" Her fists were clenched at her sides, breathing heavy, winded. He didn't hold back long.

"Montgomery's death is _bullshit_ now, is it, Kate?" Of course he would cling to that one frustrated…

"You know what is? Waiting around for your so-called partner to get it on with as many bimbos as it takes for him to keep his pants up long enough to say he _loves_ you, after I'd been** shot** at _Montgomery's funeral service_!" She inched closer to him, fury once locked away broken free, ravaging her.

He said nothing, but his face was pinched, red, and just as mad at her as she was at him.

"Yeah, I bet that's real rough, being loved." Straightening up, Castle turned from her. She wanted to slap him, punish him for ruining their partnership. Why had he given up his ground? She'd just lost it to the extent of spitting out the secret she'd been keeping from him for seven months, and he barely reacted.

_He barely reacted_. As if he already knew.

"Rick. Let me-" She reached for him and he shrugged her off. "- explain."

With no response, she backed away from him. He appeared to relax, barely, which was something, something she went with. "It was a choice I made when I woke in the recovery ward. I didn't make it because of Josh, or because of you, I made it because of me." She slowly lowered herself back to the arm of his leather chair, by the open window.

"My heart needed to heal, literally and…it was a lot to handle. I wasn't ready to confront those words, not in the way that I wanted to. And I…I had an opportunity to keep myself safe…and you too." She was looking out the window, the steady rain sprinkling water into his home, staining his leather. She wondered if he knew. "So I – "

"So you took it. And when you realized you didn't love me, you decided to pity me, and keep up the charade so that I wouldn't have to suffer the embarrassment. No thanks for the courtesy." His voice was low and harsh, accented in a way she hadn't heard in a long time – he spoke less politically when he was upset.

"That's not – not at all true! After a few sessions with my therapist…we both realized that I was on the mend, but far from mended. Even after my physical wound closed and scarred, the nonphysical remained open and bleeding. What I told you, on the swings...I haven't forgotten. That promise? It hasn't lost its meaning. To me, at least." She bowed her head, curls covering most of her face. She felt her chest heavy with the burden of her love for him, like it might not hold up.

They were back to silence. The rain was clobbering the building so hard that his leather seat would be ruined, so she absently pulled down the window. It was then that the true silence settled over them, without the mediator of the rain and rolling thunder outside of the loft.

Rick's body turned after a few moments, eyes sunken and tired. "You closed the window."

She was confused. "Your upholstery –"

"Open it." He stared daggers at her. She couldn't though, she had to…had to save the chair.

"Would it _kill_ you to respond to something I say to you? Just one time, Kate! Dammit!" Before she could rebound from the blow of his words, he was thundering towards her, her brain immobilized, body useless. He reached right over her as if she wasn't even there, throwing up the pane in an angry rush. The rain fell right back in, touching him, trickling over the skin of his fallen forearm and hand that rested under the glass.

He blinked. He changed. He looked down at her, pinned against the arm of the chair in an effort not to touch him, so near, hanging over her by the arm he used to brace himself against the back of the leather chair to reach the window. She looked frightened, and broken; hopeless, and powerless - what he'd wanted when she first made her intrusion on his writing. The sheer proximity of her gave him pause, his eyes finding hers, and vice-versa. Both searched, and softened, and he felt tears form a huddle on the lenses of his eyes.

"You don't love me anymore." She whispered up to him, breathless too at his closeness.

It wasn't that. And it exactly was. It was why the zombie walkers had been their last case. Because he couldn't _stop_. "I can't be your partner."

A tear broke the surface of her cheek, falling down the slope alongside her nose. "You can't?"

_It hurts too much_. "I'm only hurting you by staying, punishing you for things that are not your fault. I can't help the way I feel."

"Can we get coffee sometime? This weekend? Case should be over by then…." Ah, she still didn't understand.

"I don't think so, Kate." He wanted to grab her and hug her to his body, never let her go. He wanted to buy her a million more coffees. He wanted to buy her her own damn coffee house.

"Rick, I – "

"You know where the door is. I need to write." He helped her up from the chair, mistakenly by the hand, sending warm chills up his arm and into his heart. He had to let go, couldn't break now, when he was so close to saving her from the burden of him.

She inhaled sharply, the way her chest shocked when he touched her hand, pulled her up – was that a squeeze? – and she didn't want to let go. She wanted to pull him toward her by his arm, wrap her arms around him, and melt into his homey chest, his broad shoulders, his kissable neck. She wanted to dance slowly with him, melted like that against his strong body, to the song of the storm outside his loft.

Instead, she let her fingers go limp, one by one in his hand, and their connection fell away.

"We used to be more in sync." He mumbled it, as she crossed the threshold of his office. She lifted her face to him, tear-lined and hopeless, and sucked in one last brave breath, to respond.

"We still are."

And she left.

And he retreated to his room, pacing through it, into the main space of the loft, catching a glimpse of her closing the front door. He stepped towards the doorway, placed his fingers around the handle, and locked it with his other hand.

She sobbed in the rain.

And he sobbed in one room of his loft that didn't have any windows.


End file.
